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Poster: Steven Sills Date: Aug 11, 2004 11:49am
Forum: gutenberg Subject: Hello, Branko Collin, thank you for your concern

Hello, Brakano: Would it ease your mind to know that this was done through Michael Hart; that he channeled me through Professor Greg Newby: that Greg Newby read my books; and that a librarian in Canada helped me edit them. Would it ease your mind to know that An American Papyrus is catalogued in Yale and Princeton libraries among others. Thank you for your concern. To my knowledge my works are not "vanity" but think what you want. When you spend five years trying to revise each of your manuscripts--15 years of dedication to get it the way that you want it then you will know the difference between vanity and dedication to literature. I read classical literature and have done so since I was 14 years old. All I can say for sure is that I am attempting to write literature--but only heaven knows.
This post was modified by Steven Sills on 2004-08-11 18:49:08

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Poster: Branko Collin Date: Aug 11, 2004 4:32pm
Forum: gutenberg Subject: Re: Hello, Branko Collin, thank you for your concern

The word 'vanity press' means 'self-published works'; yes, in general that means that the work is published more to please the author's vanity than for some literary merit. Not having read your book, I of course cannot say if that is the case here.

Project Gutenberg probably had sound reasons when determining the rule that previously unpublished works should not be published through the project. I will trust their judgement.

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Poster: Steven Sills Date: Aug 11, 2004 8:03pm
Forum: gutenberg Subject: By all means, improve the safeguard with a good proposal

Again, all I can say is that years and years of my life have gone into these works. As you can see the three works are also catalogued by the Online Book Page at the University of Pennsylvania so they managed to get through the gates of both Project Gutenberg and the University of Pennsylvania. If you have proposals for more stringent standards please feel free to propose it to the right authorities. I assure you, Branko, that Mr. Hart looked at the published book of poetry and thought it worthy enough to get a second life through Project Gutenberg; that I then had to show the merit of the prose by having it closely scrutinized by Greg Newby; that I spent two years revising Gabriele for Project Gutenberg and one year getting a good revision of Corpus; and that a librarian and a brilliant editor in Canada helped me edit all three books to get them to the point where they were taken by Project Gutenberg. I also want to reassure you that I have stated numerous times to all the high administrators at Project Gutenberg not to include the work unless it matched the highest standards. Ultimately it was Dr. Greg Newby who put all three books on the site and no one else. As I have recently learned there are around 100 contemporary authors who have been included in Project Gutenberg. I am certain that nothing unworthy gets through the doors; but if you want to propose safeguards that are even better please talk with Dr. Newby and Michael Hart. I think that issue should be discussed, and if my works are unworthy they should be removed. Best regards, Steven Sills
This post was modified by Steven Sills on 2004-08-12 03:03:45

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Poster: glenn Date: Aug 12, 2004 4:49am
Forum: gutenberg Subject: Re: Books in need of review.

"Vanity press" is a neutral term with a negative connotation for some. I don't think it was necessarily intended insultingly. Some people consider all writing to be 'vanity' but I know the people who regularly use this online resource are more enlightened than that in general... an author who is going to devote his life to the art needs a thick skin sometimes.

I'm going to look over these 3 books, could you advise a reading order?
glenn